Terrified lest they should be called upon to part, not only with the sun and moon, but also with Freya, the personification of all the youth and beauty of the world, the gods sought Loki, and threatened to kill him unless he devised some means of hindering the architect from finishing the work within the specified time.
Changing himself into a mare, at nightfall, Loki rushed out of the forest, and neighed invitingly as Svadilfare passed by, painfully dragging one of the great blocks of stone required for the termination of the work. In a trice the horse kicked his harness to pieces and ran after the mare, closely pursued by his angry and gesticulating master. Loki, the mare, artfully lured horse and master deeper and deeper into the forest, until the night was nearly gone, and it was impossible to finish the work. Discovering the fraud, the architect (a redoubtable Hrim-thurs, in disguise) now returned to Asgard in a towering rage, and, assuming his wonted proportions, would have annihilated all the gods had not Thor suddenly confronted him, and slain him by hurling his magic hammer Miölnir full in his face.
The gods having saved themselves on this occasion only through fraud and by perjury, this murder brought great sorrows upon them, and eventually brought about their downfall and hastened the coming of Ragnarok. Loki, however, felt no remorse for what he had done, and in due time it is said he became the parent of an eight-footed steed called Sleipnir, which, as we have seen, was Odin’s favorite mount.
“But Sleipnir he begat
With Svadilfari.”
Lay of Hyndla (Thorpe’s tr.)
Loki performed so many evil deeds during his career that he richly deserved the title of “arch deceiver” which was given him. He was generally hated for his subtle malicious ways, and for an inveterate habit of prevarication which won for him also the title of “prince of lies.”
Loki’s last crime.
The last crime which he committed, and the one which filled his measure of iniquity, was to induce Hodur to throw the fatal mistletoe at Balder, whom he hated merely on account of his immaculate purity. Had it not been for his obduracy as Thok, perhaps even this crime might have been condoned; but the gods, seeing that nothing but evil remained within him, refused to allow him to remain in Asgard, and unanimously pronounced the sentence of perpetual banishment upon him.
To divert the gods’ sadness and make them, for a short time, forget the treachery of Loki and the loss of Balder, Ægir, god of the sea, invited them all to partake of a banquet in his coral caves at the bottom of the sea.